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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MoogleEmpMog" data-source="post: 2452639" data-attributes="member: 22882">D&D ties its rules to its setting only in a handful of places - spells, magic items and, apparently, ECL.  Unsurprisingly, the first two are full of exceptions to the rules rather than in accordance with them.D&D's rules for most things aren't tied to its setting in any way (as evidenced by those rules working just fine for wildly different settings).D&D provides demographics telling the player what demographics it assumes - predominantly human, with the other PHB races constituting most of the rest of the population.  I have no problem with that.  The race, class, feat and equipment options D&D offers - say, by putting them in the Player's Handbook? - do derive from its setting.  I have no problem with that, either.If, however, D&D offers an option - say, playing a hill giant? - that option should work with the rest of the rules and be as close to balanced as possible with them.I don't believe the designers set out with the intention of making the Swashbuckler, Hexblade and Samurai stronger or weaker than the core classes, for example.  Why are non-core classes designed to a similar power level, but races aren't?Now, I'll be the first to admit, the true setting-neutrality of HERO or GURPS is highly attractive to me (as far as the systems themselves are concerned, the former appeals more than the latter, but it hardly matters), one of several reasons I'd rather play HERO than standard d20.  Nonetheless, I'm only speaking from a d20/D&D perspective.  D&D sets its default classes very clearly by including only certain races in the book far, far more players own than any other - NOT by making the defaults more powerful across the board.  Why should it treat races differently?</blockquote>

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